Catcher Buster Posey remains in Triple-A Fresno because Giants officials are not convinced that he is ready to catch in the majors, GM Brian Sabean told Andrew Baggarly of The Mercury News. Sabean insists that the decision has nothing to do with service-time concerns. MLBTR's Luke Adams led a discussion post that touched on the issue over the weekend.

According to a team press release, the Mariners have relieved hitting coach Alan Cockrell of his duties. Alonzo Powell has been promoted from Triple-A Tacoma in his place.

In his latest mailbag, Hal McCoy of the Dayton Daily News writes that the Reds' next manager will not be a high-priced guy with star power. That includes Lou Piniella, who plans on making Chicago his last stop as a manager.

Jason Marquiscould be as little as two rehab assignments away from rejoining the Nationals, tweets Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post. Marquis inked a two-year, $15MM deal with the club this offseason but was sidelined after three outings in April.

I think it’s great the Johnson and LaRoche are having good starts, especially LaRoche since he usually doesn’t wake up until after the All-Star break… Hopefully Kelly can keep it up, Braves fans know how streaky he can be.

Because a-rod said something along the lines of “i’ve never heard of him, he only has a handful of wins,” basically implying that even though Braden was right about arod breaking one of baseball’s unwritten rules, he hadn’t accomplished enough in the majors to call out a “super star”. Throwing a perfect game certainly validates Braden as an MLB pitcher, and gives merit to his argument that a-rod is a self absorbed douche-tool who doesn’t respect the game.

If i was you buddy i would been trying to find the problem why that last to prefect games has been agianst your team and if you figure that out then you can run your mouth like the cry baby braden about one of the games best all around players ever though he did take steroids but he is still producing at his age and doesnt really show decline, And no it would have been fine if he did it with out acting like a manaic and trying to make himself known by excessevly talking to the media about it ,BUT Braden didnt start saying nothing till he was halfway to the dugout and yet he calls arod scared? hmmm

I’m sure it is an “unwritten rule” that he broke, but I don’t think the proper conclusion is that he doesn’t respect the game.

Remember, A-Rod is the same player who, a few years ago, shouted “I GOT IT!” to make a third baseman drop a popup thinking his shortstop had called him off. A lot of people like it, a lot of people hate it, but identifying it is simple: Gamesmanship.

Because a-rod said something along the lines of “i’ve never heard of him, he only has a handful of wins,” basically implying that even though Braden was right about arod breaking one of baseball’s unwritten rules, he hadn’t accomplished enough in the majors to call out a “super star”. Throwing a perfect game certainly validates Braden as an MLB pitcher, and gives merit to his argument that a-rod is a self absorbed douche-tool who doesn’t respect the game.

I dropped Beckham and thought that would be the big news but I dropped him for Braden who gave me first place this week(perfect games Complete games and no-hitters are catogories) I almost kept Beckham!!

I dropped Beckham and thought that would be the big news but I dropped him for Braden who gave me first place this week(perfect games Complete games and no-hitters are catogories) I almost kept Beckham!!

Posey’s offensive ability isn’t at issue, though I’m sure they want him to be swinging with a bit more put. What’s keeping him in the minors, allegedly, is that they want him to get more experience with his receiving and game calling. Sabean has expressed concern that while Posey can catch, he probably isn’t ready to handle a staff with stuff like the Giants’ – in particular, the best fastballs of pitchers like Sanchez and Wilson and Lincecum – so, he’s getting more seasoning in AAA.

Though, if you read the article, Sabean thinks all the best pitchers are in AA, and anybody who can pitch is in the majors. So Posey is getting his experience catching games for pitchers who aren’t very good. It’s typical rookie logic by Bochy and Sabean: they don’t have the skills at the major league level, so they won’t get playing time until they demonstrate that they are capable of playing at the major league level.

No matter where he’s playing, Posey should be catching every day. His value is as an offensive catcher, and the more experience he gets at the position, the better. He’s best served at the moment getting practice receiving in AAA until Bochy and Sabean get over themselves and are ready to admit that his upside is, at the very least, an order of magnitude higher than an aging, slump-prone Bengie Molina whose defense is on the decline.

Might also want to mention that Bengie is hitting .333/.402/.457/.859, that’s a pretty good reason that he’s still in the majors and Posey is not called up.

As nicely as Posey has hit in the minors, it seems like few people seem to know about how the PCL is an extreme hitter’s league nor about MLEs, as good as Posey’s numbers are now, his MLE is only .819 – which will not revolutionize an offense as many think he will – and just 11 days ago, his MLE was only .732.

And people bag on Molina’s defense, but the pitchers are part of the problem in the steals, plus as The Fielding Bible II showed in their study of catchers, Bengie Molina’s handling of catchers add run value that is above average in the majors.

And BA’s discussion of Posey’s defense in this year’s book is not complementary of his defense. Here’s a key quote: “He’s still working to improve his receiving and has problems handling quality fastballs with late life.” And who have that on our staff? Lincecum, Cain, Wilson, Sanchez, etc.

And where better to get practice handling bad pitches but in the minors where the pitchers are not as good as major league pitchers? He is not going to get that type of practice in the majors unless you have a knuckleballer on your staff. And what is wrong with having someone who is ready for the major league level? You would rather have someone not ready thrown up there to flail and fail?

The problem has not been with Sabean but that our position prospects have, for the most part, not been that good. That is because he has focused most of his scarce draft resources (first round picks) on pitching. And pitching, as BP and THT has shown in studies, is what provides competitive advantage in the playoffs – they both found offense to provide no advantage in the playoffs, hitting, homers, power, even stolen bases, do not give an advantage in the playoffs, only pitching and defense.

The thing is, nobody can guarantee what a prospect will do when he comes up, but everyone knows that the more time he gets in the minors, the more ready he will be for the majors. Ron Shandler’s Baseball Forecaster studied this and found that prospects who spent the full year in AAA tend to stick more in the majors when called up than those who start out well and is called up.

In addition, people are forgetting what happened just a year ago: Weiters was the top hitting catching prospect du jour, came up in late May, which everybody thought was crazy because he was ready, and his OPS was mostly under 700 OPS for most of the season until there was two weeks left and he went on a hot streak. And he’s no top hitter this season either, though above average.

I would understand the rancor if Molina was batting below 700 OPS, but he has been one of the best hitters on the team. And, by the way, all the starters swear by him, particularly Lincecum, who made a point about how much he loved working with Molina behind the plate. Maybe you would like to keep your two-time Cy Young winner happy?

Fred Lewis has been playing really good with us. He made one weird play in the outfield where he just stopped and watched a ball drop infront of him but other then that his range out in left has been nice.

He has solidified our leadoff spot too, all around a great addition to our team. Hard to believe we got him for nothing fron the Giants…

standtallyouregiants, the Lewis quote wasn’t in any way directed as criticism against the Giants, it was just a positive statement about the Jays, I saw the actual interview on TV. He’s just happy to be playing for the team. And Jays fans are liking him, he’s a good leadoff man and better than what we had before.

Anecdotally speaking, I think F-Lew’s routes are odd. But he takes ABs away from Bautista. And on a team allegedly going nowhere this year, that alone is worth it. Real basepath speed is also a bonus. Money oh so very well spent.

I agree with you, Lewis should just keep it quiet. We are not bitter, but he was mostly a quiet player until the end when he was angry and then he just kept on talking and complaining about the Giants.

We could do the same, he started out hot in 2009 for maybe two weeks, then was stone cold for two months before they took him out of the lineup for good. He had his chances and he blew them.

So enjoy this while this lasts. His BABIP is a good 40-50 above his career mean, when that collapses, he’ll be back to his low 700 OPS that appears to be his talent level. But he is a nice complementary player on a rebuilding team, and a nice person when he gets to start.

And I still like him and wish him well. He is actually good defensively (relatively) in LF because he has CF speed to get to balls that most stiff statue LF can’t get to, but in terms of form, instincts, and aesthetics, he is pretty ugly out there, and that is the ying and yang of Freddie Lewis, he proudly states that he’s played baseball all his life, that he loves the game since a young age, but to see him out their fielding LF is like watching Borat wrestling – it’s ain’t pretty.

And it is not necessarily nothing that we get from the Blue Jays, that player is to be named later. And I have to think that what the Giants get will probably depend on what Lewis does for the Blue Jays, so I’m rooting for him in that regard. I mean, why a PTBNL, if he’s not worth much, why not just give us some schlub prospect and be done with it?

So I’m guessing, OK hoping, that there is a pool of prospects the Giants can select from, and the pool gets bigger for every game played/started milestone that Lewis reaches. I doubt we will get any top ranked prospect for him, but the Giants seem to find nice pitchers laying around in other team’s farm systems over the years, that’s all we can really ask for Lewis, that or a failed prospect who might just need more time to figure things out (Ahrens, Fuenmayor, not really that familiar with their farm system; Edwin Encarnacion?)

Not really, The hip surgrey is what done alot of it and he took steroids in texas , now im not standing up for him and saying “oh its okay we all do mistakes” because arod barry bonds sammy sosa and people like that has ruined the integrity of baseball and it ashame. Look im saying he’s a very good player and still is at his age but everyone sooner or later as stood up for a cheater

I’m happy to see Fred doing well in TOR. He needed a fresh start in another city. By the end of his tenure with the Giants he was taking way to many pitches, was missing the ones he was swinging at and you could basically see his confidence deteriorating. His defensive skills aren’t going to improve too drastically… You haven’t seen a big enough sample size to have the true “Fred Lewis Experience” in the outfield. The change of scenery is going to clear his head at the plate. When Fred is hot, he kills it. Good luck Fred Lewis, make it happen.

Thank you ,and yes it seems more people are worried about what a-rod and the yankees think about it than the a’s and braden, and i for one am glad that he got it thats going to be the biggest thing in his career even if he wins say a cy young or 2 which i dont he will but yeah his grandma started the remark of “stick it a-rod”, but non the less congrats braden